After The War
by Bolanis
Summary: The Last Great Time War is over. Two mighty races dead. One survivor. The Doctor.


He opened his eyes; his body was tingling all over. The noise in his head had stopped, but he was gasping for breath. He put his hand towards his face to sweep away his long auburn hair from his eyes, but there wasn't any hair to push aside. He looked around him, and saw rocks and dust.

He reached into the pockets of his black frock coat and pulled out a thin, shiny, silver tube – his sonic screwdriver, he put his hand into the other pocket and his fingers held another silver item – the TARDIS key. He muttered to himself, "Let's hope this works." He moved his thumb along the screwdriver and it emitted a bright blue light from its tip, he held the shining tip next to the key and both key and screwdriver hummed tunefully.

The key glowed yellow and a deep, rasping sound became audible, dust was blown by a strong wind. The Doctor clasped the sonic screwdriver and TARDIS key tightly in both hands and smiled in contentment as the wind blew upward into his face.

He closed his eyes as the TARDIS dematerialised around him. The ship finished landing and the Doctor opened his eyes, his smile quickly disappearing off his face.

The TARDIS was a wreck; stone pillars - crumbled, the wooden floor - half of it dust. The console - stripped down to its very core - lay in the middle of this turmoil, with the time rotor pumping up and down. Echoing through the dimensional chambers of the vessel came the haunting tolling of the Cloister Bell. The Doctor stood by the door, "My ship…" he uttered in disbelief "My TARDIS… You poor thing…" He stumbled through the mess, in the dim amber light, staggering into the corridors; everything in pieces around him, he headed for an arch-way a few metres away.

He reached the arch-way; tracing his fingers along the Gallifreyan symbols on the stone arch itself, only to find the stone eroding as he touched it. He stepped into the darkness beyond the arch, a big, black, empty, room. The Time Lord stood in the middle of the space and looked upwards. Darkness.

The large Cloister Bell tolled again. This time the only echo was inside the Doctor's head. He was standing underneath it; it hung there, in the darkness, ringing to warn of impending danger. Though now it rung for sadness, and loss, and grief, and pain.

The Doctor shouted through the Cloister Room, "The Eye of Harmony… disconnected from its source… what happened?"

He had forgotten. Whether it was because of the regeneration or whether it was post-trauma, he didn't know.

Closing his eyes and concentrating, he found himself back in the main console room. He seemed calmer now, and decided that the TARDIS needed a redecoration. The Doctor crawled into the hole and started removing pipes, bells and all sorts of stuff from below the console. He fiddled and tweaked various things with his sonic screwdriver, until he found the right controls. A burst of the sonic and the entire TARDIS shook, like a dog trying to remove water from itself.

White light filled the entire TARDIS and her machinery creaked. The Doctor was grinning and laughing as he was thrown around the room, as the old time machine flung herself down the electric blue vortex; spinning and twisting.

And then she stopped, the TARDIS stopped in the middle of the vortex. It held position for a good 5 seconds and then landed.

The Doctor had stopped too. His smile wiped off his face. And he remembered.

He walked to leave the ship and to get outside, he needed some space. The grand palatial doors opened automatically, as the Time Lord approached them. He stepped through, the doors closing after him. He stood leaning against the phone box, in deep thought. Around him was a huge, bustling crowd, humans gathering in groups. Old, young, black, white, rich, poor, it was like the whole human race had decided to meet up at the same time in the same place.

With a sigh, the Doctor stood up straight, buttoned up his frock coat and walked around the corner. A loud foghorn shook him out of his thoughts and he looked up to see the large body of an ocean liner looming in dock. He didn't need to read the side to know what the ship was called; he knew this ship too well: the Titanic. "Oh," the Doctor muttered to himself, "fantastic…"

He saw a small family group not far from where he was, and approached a middle-aged woman. "They're all gone…" the Doctor said sternly, "It's my fault… they all died and I can't let that happen to you." The lady looked at him, "No, of course not," she said slightly knocked back by what the Doctor just said. "Excuse me, my family and I have a ship to catch." The Doctor just stared at her: "Look, you all go toddling onto that ship, you stupid apes think its Noah's Ark – two by two" he mimed walking with his fingers. "You miss out on the ice alert and the Ark gets its flood. No rainbow. No dove." The Doctor continued talking, "So, Mrs…?" The lady looked confused for a moment and then answered "Urm, Daniels… Mrs. Daniels." The Doctor looked happy with her answer – "So, Mrs. Daniels, cancel your trip, go home and have a chance to live – hurrah – hurrah!" He grinned and turned on his heel about to walk away, when he nearly bumped into a photographer heading towards the family.

"Oh, I'm sorry…" apologised the Doctor, trying to move out of the man's way. The old gentlemen peered upwards at this strange man who seemed out of place, yet he fitted right in. "Photograph with the family, Sir?" asked the gentlemen enquiringly. This made the Time Lord smile slightly, "Certainly." The Doctor managed to leave the Daniels Family once the photo had been taken, they hadn't minded him being there, so he guessed they were going to take his advice. He headed back to the TARDIS.

The Doctor poked his head in the door, apprehensive of how the TARDIS had changed. Walking in, he seemed impressed and immediately saw on the coat stand next to him a set of clothes; "Oh, that's more me!"

Without hesitation, the Doctor changed out of his dusty waistcoat and smart trousers and put on the dark jeans and maroon jumper. Picking up the battered leather jacket, he glanced at the scanner, immediately he knew what it meant. "That's all I need..." the Doctor moaned at the thought. Shrugging the jacket onto his shoulders he felt something in the pocket, he reached in and pulled out a test-tube of shimmering liquid: "Ah!" he said and grinned.

He gathered a few items together, including his sonic screwdriver and TARDIS key and put them in brand new places in his jacket. The Doctor stopped the ship and landed it right outside a huge department store in London, Earth.

* * *

Finally he had found a way in. A load of corridors – a bit cold, not very damp, dark, and something in the air to arouse the senses and give you goose bumps; The Doctor liked this. He hadn't done this sort of thing for a long time and the whole thrill of adventure nearly made him stop thinking about the Time War. But it wasn't the same: the emptiness in his heart and in his head, the anger still pulsing through him. That's what the War had done to him.

The screwdriver beeped occasionally just to reassure the Doctor he was on the right track. He wondered if he needed to memorise an exit route or whether he could improvise – he seemed to be good at that. He glanced at some of the mannequins he was passing, they were moving already. He knew that if the autons were active then any humans in their way didn't stand a chance...

Then he heard a panicked girl's voice ahead of him, "Oh no..." he thought. He hurried through doors, hearing the sound of objects clattering and the horrifying screeching of the plastic creatures. This was his cue; he saw the girl trapped against the wall, the autons, with their featureless faces making her too scared to try and move.

He took hold of her hand, looked directly at her, and said; "Run!"


End file.
